I'm planning a 1 week vacation with my wife and daughter for sometime in Mid August. Anyone care to divulge a bit of info for me to get out and do a bit of fishing? We're probably just going to rent a condo for the week just off the boardwalk. May be a good time to finally break in my 10wt setup I bought last year. (also have an 8wt I'll probably bring). Any info on where to go, and flies to use/tie would be greatly appreciated. Also what species could I expect to get into at that time of year?

never fly fished there, but i've spent quite a bit of time surf fishing the area. Here is what you can expect in the surf. Perhaps someone else can give you more of a clue about the bay (I never spent much time in the bays aside from occassional tog fishing from the 3rd street bulkhead, and occassional flounder trips with friends.

Can't advise you on what you can do with the 10wt as all my surf fishing thus far has been with conventional reels/surf rods (I like to fish for sharks, stripers, and big blues with that stuff).

If you decide to do any fishing with spinning or conventional gear, pm me and i'll give you info on that.

For now - just info on species in the surf that can be expected...how you catch them on the fly? different story...

i do oc, nj every year. i take a spinning rod to the beach with me and lob bait. when we take a family walk at evening, i take a spinning rod and lob plugs.

when i have time alone, i goto the bay and pretend to fly fish. first year i went, i took a 10wt and it was hard on me. next year, i took an 8wt and overlined it, and it was much more fun. this year, i'm taking that cgr, and will enjoy it immensely. somewhere is a thread about chincotigue, where i answered someone's questions. find it and read it and apply it.

Same story for me...I have surf fished and fished the bay with conventional spinning tackle but have not fly fished down there. We usually stay in Fenwick Island - just across the DE border but for all practical purposes it's OC, MD.

Trow is spot on on the surf species. It goes in runs where the sportfish are good for a couple days, and then disappear for a few days. It seems like you can always catch Dogfish and skates though. When the wind blows from the NE the surf gets pushed up pretty high and it becomes impossible to hold bottom with spinning tackle. I imagine it would be darn near impossible to cast a fly into that as well. That pattern was our whole week down there last year and made for lousy fishing. After a couple slow mornings, I just opted to sleep in for the rest of the trip. Best times always seemed to between the hour before and after sunrise and sunset.

The bay should fish well in August. Should be loaded with Croaker and Spot at that point in the summer, along with the occasional weakfish. Try around the Rt. 90 bridge for those. Flounder can usually be had south of the Rt. 90 bridge all the way past the Rt. 50 bridge to the inlet. Hope that helps a little and good luck.

In assateaque ( pardon my spelling) I saw man fly fishing an inlet where we went crabbing. I saw him get a nice bite but missed the fish. That's calmer water then at the actual beach though. At The pier at The end of the boardwalk I've caught some flounder and there's been times where I've sat there all night catching blues. The blues are hit or miss though. It depends on where there schools are. Also a lot of stingrays and sand sharks that are lots of fun to catch. Ocean city is better overall for spin fishing.

You can definitely catch flounder on the fly. I've never done it but I know people do with big clouser minnows, etc. Really anything that looks like a baitfish and sinks will work. Just get it in either chartreuse or white (i like white). Some people like pink...

It would be nice if this year they had an August croaker run like they used to have 10 or 15 years ago?

Back then 16 to 18 inch fish were plentiful and when the flounder weren't biting you could almost gaurantee a double of croakers on a top and bottom rig. It was good enough that we often ran out of bait and just fished twister tails and jelly grubs and still caught them.

They are a lot like baby redfish and they will hit a Clouser minnow too, the issue will be finding them. Decent sized ones are very good eating BTW. You may want to consider renting a small boat and working the edges of the channel, that's how we did it back in the day.

Bahia Marina rents boats but that's about the only place down there that I've ever found?

The surf that time of year is real hit or miss. There are always some kingfish or spot but it takes structure and bait to bring schoolie sized stripers and blues into the suds. They won't be real big but if they come in you can catch enough fish to about 5 pounds to make it worth your while.

If you are going to fly fish off the beach you will need a stripping basket. Buy one or make one out of a $ 3.00 dishpan from Wally World but you will need one because line control while retrieving is critical in the surf.

Dropping the line at your feet when you retrieve will result in a lot of headaches upon hooking a fish or even just beginning another cast because the line will wash all over the beach with the wave action.

If you make a stripping basket add 4 to 6 hoops made out of .080 diameter weedwhacker line to the basket. Just cut the line in 12" or so sections and drill holes about 3 to 4" apart in the bottom of the basket. Insert the line in adjoining holes and burn the ends of it with a lighter so the line can't pull out. The hoops make the line lay in looser coils and it is much easier to cast.

Good luck, I'll be in North Bethany the first week of August but I'll probably spend my time at Indian River Inlet.

Regards,

Tim Murphy

Posted on: 2011/6/12 9:23

_________________
"Then the coal company came with the world's largest shovel, and they tortured the timber and stripped all the land. Well they dug for their coal till the land was forsaken, then they wrote it all down as the progress of man."

I do not care about "sport fish," I want to catch skates. How do I catch skates on conventional tackle or, sweet babby jebus, flies?

Give me the secret!

I think the best way on any tackle is to simply try not to catch them...that will get you surely get you skates all day long, or at least it does for me. Hope you get lots of them...

Aside - I saw a guy cutting the wings off of them one time...assumed it was for bait strips...Nope, he told me the wings on the larger ones weren't half bad eating. Give me a blackened striper fillet instead any day...

Swattie87 wrote:I think the best way on any tackle is to simply try not to catch them...that will get you surely get you skates all day long, or at least it does for me. Hope you get lots of them...

Bait?

To be honest, I just don't really know what I'm doign when I'm bait fishing, because its not my thing and I find it terminally boring to throw something in the water then just watch it.

When I go, I've been buying those fishbites sandworm things, that's generally all I throw out because I only buy one bag. I also buy a full frozen mackeral and chunk it up to despertly hope for a shark each year, also to no fruitition.

To be honest, I just don't really know what I'm doign when I'm bait fishing, because its not my thing and I find it terminally boring to throw something in the water then just watch it.

When I go, I've been buying those fishbites sandworm things, that's generally all I throw out because I only buy one bag. I also buy a full frozen mackeral and chunk it up to despertly hope for a shark each year, also to no fruitition.

Didn't think you were being serious at first...sorry for the semi wise guy response before. I agree on the just sitting and watching theory, but it's really tough to fish the surf any other way. I usually will cast out and then put the rod up in its holder and resume reading, sleeping, eating, drinking, etc. The fish usually hook themselves and a rapidly twitching rod tip will alert you when a fish is on. I'm sure I miss a lot of strikes this way, but fishing is usually a side event when I'm at the beach with my wife/family anyway.

I usually throw a two hook setup with a 3 or 4 oz pyramid sinker. I will buy two rigs, one with small Kingfish/Croaker hooks and one with bigger Striper/Bluefish hooks and swap one hook on each out with the other. That way each rig has one bigger hook and one smaller hook on it. On the small hook I usually put a piece of bloodworm up the hook and then a thin triangle piece of squid on the end of the hook. On the bigger hook I usually either put a larger piece of squid strip or a whole frozen mullet or large frozen shiner. Squid strips are the best bait overall though if you're just looking to hook into something. Pretty much everything will eat a squid strip, including skates. I've also caught some sublegal, but still nice stripers on squid though too. That's the best part of the surf I think...you never know what's on the end of the line...kind of makes up for the boredom of a generally more passive form of fishing.

No, I was completely serious. I find the beach to be terminally boring, so if I can maximize my amusement, I will. This means that while the family goes, I just soak bait and try to keep myself as amused as possible.

I'll just be replicating your setup, adjusting for surf and weight. I noticed that regardless of what people say, I seem to have the best luck after noon hightide, but again, I don't really care to target "sportfish" and just like to feel things tug.

Yeah my bad... I've been spiked by a balled up skate one too many times I guess...unless they're literally the only thing biting that day I'm usually not too thrilled when I pull one in. Sometimes they can keep a day from being a total bust though.

Seriously though, be careful getting them off the hook if you do catch any...they don't really have teeth and there's no barb like a stingray on their tails, but their backs have rows of spikes for armor. They tend to pull their wings into a ball like shape when they're out of the water to maximize the size of the armor. I take a glove along with me now, and usually just try to get them off with the pliers without grabbing them first.

Good news is that I've generally found on days when you catch skates you also catch Dogfish too...they're usually small in the surf but they're pretty cool and less of a pain to take off the hook. Plus you get to say you caught a shark.

You may need more than 4 oz's to hold bottom some days, but I don't like chucking that much weight...if I feel like I need more than that I just don't fish that day.

I can catch plenty of dogfish, seems most days that's abotu it, but on a big ole spinning rod they don't really do much. Skates, at least the ones I have caught, are pretty powerful and seem to be able to pull line and require some work.